Greg Mottola is good with people who are embarrassed by what they want. We like the warmth and restraint of his comedies, though the writing does not always give his actors enough to work with.
Fi1m perspective
In Nobody Wants This (2024), Kristen Bell and Adam Brody make the attraction between their characters convincing enough to carry us past some thin writing. We enjoyed their company because the romance felt credible, even when the obstacles needed more thought. Mottola directs episodes of the series, so we should not give him sole credit for what works. But the leads’ ease together fits his preference for natural performances and comedy built from awkward situations.
He wrote and directed the independent road comedy The Daytrippers (1996), then spent years directing television, including Undeclared (2001) and Arrested Development (2003). Superbad (2007) brought his mainstream breakthrough, keeping a large ensemble lively without neglecting the individual characters. With Adventureland (2009), he returned to writing and directing more personal material about coming of age. Its feeling develops without requiring the comedy to stop for a solemn passage. He has since moved between studio comedies, television and writer-director projects such as Confess, Fletch (2022).
He favours making actors comfortable and letting scenes play in real time, which helps explain why the performances can feel unforced. That approach suits his recurring interest in young adulthood, when embarrassment can be painful enough without a director insisting that we laugh. The broader assignments include the science-fiction road comedy Paul (2011), with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost. The uneven Keeping Up with the Joneses (2016) gives us less reason to recommend him indiscriminately.
Our reservations about Nobody Wants This are more specific. The supporting cast is funny, but the writing makes too little of the religious differences it puts between the leads. We want the romance to work, and we also want the series to think harder about the difficulty it has chosen for them. Start there for Bell and Brody, with the caveat that the series is better at attraction than at taking their differences seriously.
Biography
Greg Mottola is an American film and television director and screenwriter. He was born on 11 July 1964 in Dix Hills, New York, and holds a BFA from Carnegie Mellon University and an MFA in film from Columbia University.
Mottola wrote and directed the independent feature The Daytrippers (1996). He later directed episodes of television series including Arrested Development before returning to features with Superbad (2007), Adventureland (2009), which he also wrote, Paul (2011) and Confess, Fletch (2022). He has directed episodes of Nobody Wants This (2024).
